


when they called your name

by munna



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Meta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-27
Updated: 2015-03-27
Packaged: 2018-03-19 23:11:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3627816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/munna/pseuds/munna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>iron bull's the only one who says her name right; but adaar likes it better when josephine says it. [josephine/adaar meta drabble]</p>
            </blockquote>





	when they called your name

Adaar likes it when the Iron Bull says her name. 

He's the only one who says it right, though she's not surprised; everyone else either tries too hard or not enough, their syllables sharp and harsh. But Bull says it _just right_. 

_Aasshaalla_. He leans in when he says it, soft and low like it's a secret. Whispering like the sands of the desert her mother carried her over; like the prayers she repeated every night before they slept, pleading to some unknown entity, _"Please keep her safe, please guide her Asala when she sleeps, where a mother's love cannot follow, please, please, please..."_

Adaar likes it when the Iron Bull says her name. But she likes it better when Josephine says it. 

She watches the Ambassador's lips when she says it, mouth moving slowly to form the word-- _Ahssaala_. The syllables are completely off, but the way the corner of Josephine's mouth flicks up, the light in her eyes--well that's just right. When she greets her after every return, her voice is so bright and buoyant; _Ashala, Ashala,_ like when the sunlight filters through the windows on a summer day, _Ashala, Ashala,_ like when her mother would lift her up as a child and throw her into the air, _Ashala, Ashala,_ like the first time Katoh called her _kadan_ , the word filled with a love Adaar never felt worthy of. 

She doesn't feel worthy of this kind of love either, but she wants, oh she wants it. She wants to sweep Josephine off her feet and into her arms, wants to kiss her forehead, her eyes, her nose, her cheeks, her lips, wants to meet Josephine's mother over tea, awkwardly bent over and forgetting that it's rude to rest your elbows on the table, she wants to see Yvette's half-finished paintings and listen to her melodramatic teen poetry, she wants to take Josephine to the crawl space of a house she lived in, wants her to meet the rest of Valos-Kas, crude and rambunctious as they are, and most of all she wants to wake up every morning and hear _Ahssaala, Ahssaala, Ahssaala_ until the day she dies. 

The Iron Bull says Adaar's name right. But Josephine says it best.

**Author's Note:**

> just a little meta piece focused on my mage!adaar, ashala (which roughly translates from qunlat to 'to seek the soul'; adaar's mama picked it out) and josephine and language and names. also iron bull is there bc when he is not. 
> 
> also katoh was a member of the valo-kas mercenary group the qunari inquisitor starts in.


End file.
